


Larger and Further Away

by The_Exile



Category: Mother 2: Gyiyg no Gyakushuu | EarthBound
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Foreshadowing, M/M, Medication, Mother 3 References, Nightmares, Post-Game(s), Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Spoilers, Worldbuilding, mild canon fourth wall breaking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-04
Updated: 2020-06-04
Packaged: 2021-03-03 21:55:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,211
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24542686
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/The_Exile/pseuds/The_Exile
Summary: Jeff says the world isn't quite at peace yet and Tony gets the feeling he might be right, but now its time for them to rest and rebuild their everyday lives. Jeff still flashes back every night to the battle with Giygas and specifically the trauma of leaving his body. Tony helps him as best he can, out of affection and in return for all the times he's been saved by Jeff... and also because of a certain voice that isn't quite gone from his head.
Relationships: Jeff Andonuts/Tony
Comments: 1
Kudos: 14
Collections: Rare Male Slash Exchange 2020





	Larger and Further Away

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ShamanicShaymin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShamanicShaymin/gifts).



Jeff had woken up with a loud yelp. Tony, slumbering beside him, had been roused by the noise. Instinctively, he leaned over and embraced the young man who was now convulsing, staring at his jerkily moving hands as though he didn't quite recognise them, had forgotten how to use them. Pressed tightly against the other boy's chest, breathing in his scent and warmed by his body heat, Jeff began to quieten down to a series of distressed low moans, his limbs still twitching.

"Stop doing that. You'll hurt yourself," whispered Tony, "You're safe."

"Wasn't working," muttered Jeff, "My body. Couldn't keep myself inside."

"It's not happening any more," said Tony, "That's all gone now. The robot's gone. You're in your own body. Giygas is gone. You can't go back there. You're here with me in our house. I've got you safe." 

"Felt real," Jeff moaned, "Couldn't feel anything. Couldn't move. It hurts, I can still see the red..."

"You had a bad dream," said Tony, "Its just sleep paralysis, remember the doctor talking about it?"

"You don't know its gone for good. Or that I was put back in properly."

"You're always okay when you wake up, aren't you? I can run the bath, give you a quick massage. Then when you're properly awake, we can go and see that the world's still all back to normal, like it was yesterday. No crazy people or animals, no UFOs, no ghosts..."

Tony could feel Jeff's body already relaxing, his breathing getting deeper, his muscles softening. He was a good masseur - not quite strong enough but he had a good technique. He'd been looking into getting a job with the healer's, which courses he could apply for in Fourside with a qualification from a respectable school like Snow Wood. He had savings and Jeff fixed machines for money but he wanted to go out and do something useful soon, now that all the chaos had died down from the crisis they'd all been through. He thought about his options some more as he began running the bath and made them both a cup of tea. Thinking about fairly abstract, practical things helped him stay grounded when he was dealing with Jeff in a state like this, when his mind was still half in the past, in the insanity of the last few days of his long battle to save the world. 

This was a regular occurrence these days, even with the medication he'd been prescribed. Jeff still seemed scared of a long list of things that had, admittedly, been lethally hostile to him during the time when literally anything could be possessed by Giygas - dogs, cops, mice, mushrooms, fire hydrants, surrealist art... Tony had to dissuade his boyfriend from going everywhere armed with experimental military-grade weaponry, which he still had a laboratory full of, out there in Winters, still tended by that huge, amiable prehistoric man who had been discovered, wandering lost in the middle of Stonehenge until he was bribed with picnic baskets by Jeff's father. 

His dad was still nowhere to be found. Tony had to agree with Jeff that it was odd, maybe a sign that things still weren't quite right. He'd stayed behind in Saturn Valley for a long time after the battle was over, along with all the other people he'd recruited to assist him with building the transporters and the robot bodies. Someone had to safely dismantle them all, store them where they couldn't be found and misused, find out where the one remaining unaccounted-for Phase Distorter had gone, try and make proper diplomatic arrangements with the Mister Saturns.

The battle with Giygas had been tough on them all, Tony knew. They still kept in contact with Ness and Paula, even receiving letters from Poo every now and then. The Prince had thrown himself into his Mu training with even more fervor as a way to steel his mind against the things he'd witnessed, the effects the memories were still having on him. Ness and Paula relied on each other and on their families. Jeff had Tony and his work - and Tony didn't think it was a good idea to let Jeff get too deeply engrossed in his work. He kept trying to build new robot bodies, much bigger ones with shoulder-mounted rocket launchers, just in case. 

Half an hour later, wrapped in a dressing gown, hair in a towel (it was growing rakishly long these days), Jeff warmed his hands on another cup of tea and apologised.

"You shouldn't have to be nursing me like a kid," he said, "I'm supposed to be a hero of the planet or something."

Jeff came across in attitude about as much of a heroic savior as, well, as Tony did, but he tried his best not to laugh, "It's okay, Jeff - if anything, this is payment for saving me. Not just from Giygas but all those other times. When I was lonely, when the school ghost kept bugging me, then that goat in the woods... remember the goat?"

"I was terrified of it myself, to be honest," said Jeff, "I didn't even know for sure that the air rifle I'd made was working yet. And the teachers came and chased it away in the end."

"But you stood up to it and kept it away until Maxwell could run for help," said Tony, "The big billy goats are scary enough when they're normal. That one was the first possessed animal we'd seen."

"I mean, I had to protect you, 'cause, you know, it's you," Jeff blushed, "I should have stuck with just goats and ghosts. I was never cut out to be a hero."

"Well, the sort of battle you're fighting right now is one we can fight together," said Tony.

Jeff took the other boy's hands, then stared meaningfully at him for a while,  
before putting down his now empty tea cup.

"There's still something up, though," he frowned.

"It's okay, she said that's not our battle any more," said Tony.

"Who said what, now?"

Tony flinched and shook his head, suddenly aware that he'd drifted off.

"You looked and sounded weird for a second," added Jeff, "You sure you're okay?"

"Um... Paula. Was just talking to her," lied Tony.

"In your head, you mean? I thought she said she wasn't going to do that any more."

"Um... I didn't mean now. In a dream," muttered Tony, "Woke me up. Couldn't get back to sleep."

"You look like you need a lot more sleep. I hope you haven't been losing sleep over me!"

He shook his head, "It... um... happened a few times. I'll have a word with her about it."

Jeff nodded, then turned away, muttering about how something was definitely still not right and then something else about upgrading the toaster. Tony left him to it and went into the bathroom to look at his rather sleep-deprived features in the mirror.

The voice in his head had not been Paula. It had been the other voice, the one from a lot further away, from somewhere higher. The one he'd told to take care of Jeff that time because they were probably the only one who could.

Maybe he wasn't quite back to normal either, after all.


End file.
